Editing Woodward, Oklahoma (section)

===Settlement as a town===
In April 1887, the Southern Kansas Railway, a subsidiary of the [[Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway]], built tracks from [[Kiowa, Kansas]] to [[Fort Reno (Oklahoma)|Fort Reno]] Military Road near the south bank of the [[North Canadian River]].<ref name="okpedia">{{cite encyclopedia |last=James |first=Louise Boyd |url=http://www.okhistory.org/publications/enc/entry.php?entry=WO016 |title=Woodward |encyclopedia=Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and Culture |publisher=[[Oklahoma Historical Society]] |edition=online |date=2009 |access-date=February 27, 2015}}</ref>  European-American settlers established Woodward at this junction. The source of the name of the town a mystery. People perhaps named the town for Brinton W. Woodward, usually identified as a Santa Fe Railway director, or bison hunter, teamster, and eventually local saddle-maker Richard "Uncle Dick" Woodward.

The town quickly developed as an important shipping point, both for provisioning [[Fort Supply (Oklahoma)|Fort Supply]] and as a place for loading cattle grazed in the [[Cherokee Outlet]] for shipment to eastern markets. Woodward ranked among the most important depots in the Oklahoma Territory for shipping cattle to the Eastern and Northern states. The [[Great Western Cattle Trail]] met the railroad where Woodward developed. In the summer of 1893, carpenters erected the first government building at the railroad depot, called Woodward. Woodward then had 200 residents.

On September 16, 1893, officials opened the [[Cherokee Outlet]] across northern Oklahoma, which more than 50,000 migrants settled in the greatest [[land run]] in American history. A surveying error then caused location of the government town, its land office, and other public buildings in the section west of the existing improvements, 15 blocks away from the depot, post office, and stockyards. Since territorial days, Woodward served as the county seat of [[Woodward County]].

Two towns developed: East Woodward, called Denver, began near the improvements, and Woodward began near the land office. In October 1894, people moved the depot west and relocated it between 5th Street and 6th Street; East Woodward businesses followed the depot. Government in time moved the land office, jail, and other buildings east toward the depot. The towns merged into one. The joining resulted in the curve in the long Main Street of the town at 8th Street, originally Boundary Street.

On March 13, 1894, outlaws [[Bill Doolin]] and [[William M. Dalton|Bill Dalton]] robbed the railroad station at Woodward, taking an undisclosed amount of money.

Like [[Dodge City, Kansas]], to the North, Woodward boasted a cattle town array of saloons, gambling halls, and brothels. Drovers widely knew the Equity, Midway, Shamrock, and Cabinet saloons of Woodward and the Dew Drop Inn as their watering holes at the end of a cattle drive. Dollie Kezer worked at some of most famous brothels of [[Denver, Colorado]], and [[Horace Tabor]] threw lavish parties that she attended before coming to Woodward, where she owned and managed the Dew Drop Inn, which served as another watering hole and also as a brothel.

In 1894, [[Temple Lea Houston]], former Texas state senator and son of [[Samuel Houston]], moved his law practice and family to Woodward. After a personal disagreement in the Cabinet Saloon with the brother and father of the outlaw [[Al Jennings]], Houston shot and killed the brother. [[Jack E. Love]] joined his close friend, Temple Lea Houston, in the gunfight. The events slowed the career of neither man. Authorities in Woodward charged and tried Houston for murder, but a jury acquitted him on grounds of self-defense. Houston won a reputation as a brilliant trial lawyer, known for his courtroom dramatics. He delivered his "[[S:Soiled Dove Plea|Soiled Dove Plea]]" in a makeshift courtroom in the Woodward opera house, arguing on behalf of a prostitute who worked at the Dew Drop Inn; after ten minutes' consideration, the jury acquitted her. Houston died in 1905 in Woodward and is buried there.

People later elected [[Jack E. Love]] to the [[Oklahoma Corporation Commission]], and he served as its first chairman.

Woodward ranked as one of the most extensive cattle shipping points in Oklahoma Territory. Some men rode for the large cattle outfits of the 1890s and later developed rodeo as a sport. Cow ponies, tied to hitching posts, lined the sandy Main Street.

When open range ended in 1901, however, homesteaders rushed into Woodward County. By late 1902 farmers' wagons filled with corn, cotton, or sorghum crops for market had already replaced the cow ponies.

On September 7, 1907, [[William Jennings Bryan]] spoke to 20,000 people gathered in Woodward, urging the ratification of proposed state constitution of Oklahoma and the election of a [[Democratic Party (United States)|Democratic Party]] ticket. Two months later, President [[Theodore Roosevelt]] signed the act of Congress proclaiming admission of Oklahoma as a state, using a quill from an American [[golden eagle]] captured near Woodward. At that time the population of Woodward exceeded 2,000.